THE PHONE CALL.

The sky was strange that morning, dull yellow and restless clouds swirling above Bhubaneswar.It was the morning of 29 October 1999.

Sunita was preparing breakfast for her son Anuj, glancing occasionally at the television where news of a super storm played.

Anuj was getting ready to go to college for the practical class of electronics.

“Are you sure,you would attend it” Sunita frowned.

“How can I miss the practical class maa?They always say cyclone cyclone and by that time it reaches here, it will be just rain,” said Anuj while tying his shoe lace.”Don’t worry, I am taking the rain coat.”

She didn’t enjoy or approve what her son said .

Just then the land phone rang.

“What is your son doing ?” asked Sunita’s brother .

“He is getting ready to attend his practical class at 7 in his college ”

“Are you out of your mind? Practical class !

The cyclone path has shifted.Its  not moving north anymore.Its coming straight to Bhubaneswar.This isn’t an ordinary storm.Stop him.Give him the phone.Let me talk to him .”

The phone got dead suddenly and lights went off and the television too got dead.The cyclone hit with a force no one had imagined.

By 7:15 the roads were flooded.Sunita stood frozen by the window watching a large banyan tree split in two and crashed into the road, the very road her son would have taken to college.With pounding heart she looked at her son.A chill went through Anuj’s spine.

“O my God.What would have happened?”,thought Anuj.

The continuous, deafening and screeching and roaring noise , even terrified Anuj’s brave father.He went near Sunita and hugged to pacify her.”you chicken heart, dont fear. Me and Anuj are with you.”For hours they huddled together in the dark , listening to the groan,the wind’s fury.

Outside they saw their neighborhood in ruins.Walls collapsed, uprooted electric polls and twisted vehicles portrayed a terrifying scenario.

The breakfast was still in the kitchen.No one had taken even tea also .Sunita braved with her trembling self to go to the kitchen to make tea .Both hubby and son accompanied her.Silently all drank the tea thinking about the inconceivable thing.No doubt there was sufficient warning before hand, but nobody had taken it to happen like that.

Outside their closed house , the tandav of the super cyclone was going on.The horrible sound was unbearable.Torrential rain had started by the time, making the condition more miserable.

Sunita looked at hubby and son, ” if your mamu hadn’t called..….She started crying.

Anuj nodded slowly. A shiver ran through him.He realized how a single call had slipped through fate itself.”Baba how could mamu call in the nick of the time and just after his warning everything stopped!”

“It’s his love for you Anuj,”

A butterfly flapped its wings three kilometers away at mamu’s place, and because of that he was alive.

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